Google Stops Selling Nexus 6 via Google Store

KARACHI: In what may turn out to be an important breakthrough for Pakistan’s Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector, the Android 6.0 Marshmallow – the latest version of Google’s smartphone operating system – comes with support for Urdu language. Earlier in September, the Silicon Valley-based technology giant unveiled two of its new ‘Nexus’ smartphones – the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P along with Android 6.0, according to a post on ‘The Mobile Indian’.

With rising Internet penetration and free-access-to-Internet projects, the latest operating system will connect more people who will be able to create content in Urdu. Since the rollout of third-generation (3G) mobile technology, which started in mid-2014, Pakistan has been adding more than one million new users to its mobile Internet base every month – the number of broadband users in the country skyrocketed to 23 million at the end of October, 2015, up from less than 4 million before 3G auction. “When it comes to content, language does make a difference,” says A R Rafiq, who runs a software development company and is actively involved with Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA) for IT and IT-enabled services. The entrepreneur from Silicon Valley says this new feature would help streamline the process of development as more apps could be developed in Urdu – one of the top five most-spoken languages. “It will support developers and content creators who prefer Urdu,” he says. “The Urdu content is usually not searchable because of its image format,” says Khushnood.